The second retreat of SFB 1604 — Production of Migration — took PIs and researchers to one of the more spartan seminar rooms of Osnabrück University on January 22nd 2025 for an intense and productive exchange on how individual projects make the transition from developing a reflexive approach to implementing a reflexive research practice.
One of the four projects giving presentations on that stage of their work (B4, B1, A4 and A3) was „Ihr seid Gastarbeiterkinder“ Science, School and the Production of Figures of Migration (A3), directed by PIs Prof. Dr. Lale Yildirim and Prof. Dr. Christoph Rass together with doctoral researchers Maik Hoops and Ahmet Celikten.

Their talk, titled From Critique to Practice: Embedding Reflexivity in Project A3, departed from the observation that migration research has increasingly engaged with reflexivity as a methodological and epistemological tool, aiming to interrogate the ways in which knowledge is produced, categorized, and institutionalized. The presenters then explored paths to implement a reflexivity approach of the first and the second order in a project examining the role of migration-related research in shaping figures such as the Gastarbeiterkind in Germany since the 1960s.
At the core of the reflexive approach lies the acknowledgment that academic categories are not neutral descriptors but rather embedded within broader socio-political and epistemological structures. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of reflexivity, project A3 proposed building a reflexive methodology based on a systematic self-examination of the researcher’s own position, biases, and methodological choices as a tool to scrutinize the disciplinary framework that has long shaped migration research itself.


A Reflexive Methodological Framework
The talk outlined a structured approach to integrating reflexivity into historiographical research on migration. To this end, project A3 proposed a six-step model that combines self-reflexivity with methodological reflexivity:
Clarifying positionality within an interdisciplinary and diverse research team in a way that ensures that reflexivity does not lapse into self-absorption but becomes a tool for epistemic critique.
Tracing conceptual shifts by integrating historical semantics and conceptual history to analyze how migration-related categories have evolved.
Treating migration studies texts published from the 1960s to the 2010s as historical sources, thereby analyzing how academic knowledge about migration has been produced and stabilized.
Developing a theory-based methodology that interrogates dominant epistemological frameworks.
Scaling the approach from a small qualitative to a broader empirical analyses while maintaining reflexive coherence across.
Ensuring sound theoretical grounding as a foundation for critical engagement with historical and contemporary migration discourses in all phases of the project.
This methodological structure reflects A3’s commitment to historicizing the production of migration knowledge by studying the creation of dominant epistemologies, narratives, and categories through the analysis of academic publications in the field where the project reads as process-generated sources.
Knowledge Production and Thought Collectives
The talk linked five theoretical approaches to situate this position: Ludwig Fleck’s Denkkollektiv, Michel-Roplhs Trouillot’s critique of the production of history, Gurminder Bhambra’s demand for alternative epistemologies, Thomas Nail’s concept of the figure of the migrant and post-migrant theory as forwarded by Paul Mecheril and Naika Fourutan.
Ludwik Fleck argued that knowledge is produced within distinct intellectual communities, each with its own thought style, shaping what is considered significant, which methodologies are employed, and which categories become dominant. By applying this framework to migration research, the project looks at how scholars have historically operated within thought collectives that not only shape knowledge, but also constrain alternative epistemologies.

This approach aligns with Michel-Rolph Trouillot’s seminal critique of historiography in Silencing the Past, underscoring how history is produced through structured processes of voice and silence. Trouillot’s model — analyzing the making of sources, archives, narratives, and significance — serves as a powerful tool for understanding how migration research has constructed narratives over time and what voices became dominant or were marginalized.
Beyond Deconstruction: Towards a New Epistemology
The reflexive migration research proposed in this talk moves beyond merely deconstructing existing categories to actively construct new epistemological frameworks. Engaging with post-migrant theory, as developed by scholars such as Naika Foroutan and Paul Mecheril, the project seeks to challenge the idea of migration as an exception. Instead, it positions mobility as a constitutive element of social structures, dismantling entrenched binaries and centering marginalized perspectives.
Thomas Nail’s kinetic theory of migration further supports this argument by conceptualizing migration as a fundamental force in shaping political and social orders. The project applies this perspective to analyze how figures such as the migranticized child have been constructed within the educational system, serving to reinforce hierarchical structures of belonging.
Gurminder Bhambra’s critique of dominant epistemologies in Rethinking Modernity: Postcolonialism and the Sociological Imagination (2007) resonates with this project’s approach, as she calls for a reconstitution of core analytical categories rather than merely expanding existing perspectives.
Operationalizing Reflexivity: The Role of Coding and Corpus Analysis
An essential aspect of the project’s reflexive approach is its empirical dimension. The research team compiled a corpus of over 3,000 academic texts from the 1960s to the 2010s on migration and society in Germany with a focus on the educational system, analyzing how migration knowledge has evolved over time. This large-scale textual analysis is structured using a two-level coding process.
Descriptive coding identifies the terms and designations used for migranticized figures and tracing their transformations.
Analytical coding constructs a reflexive framework that is independent of dominant research paradigms, allowing for a critical interrogation of knowledge production.

While descriptive coding will be performed with the help of text mining tools to map the use of categories in the corpus, the analytical code tree will depart from Paul Mecheril’s use of concepts such as inclusive exclusion into his research on migration and the German educational system.
A3 thereby leans on the concepts developed by Giorgio Agamben and Étienne Balibar, particularly their notions of inclusive exclusion and exclusive inclusion, to examine how migration is simultaneously integrated and marginalized within discourse and policy. By applying these concepts to education and social policies, this study highlights the structural mechanisms that perpetuate migrant marginalization while ostensibly promoting inclusion.
Reflexivity as a Transformative Force in Migration Research
“Second-level reflexivity in A3
Doing reflexivity in A3 @ SFB 1604
means analyzing the formation
of long-dominant doxa
in migration research
from a juxtaposed position
by applying
a reflexive methodology
to our Denkkollektiv.”
The central argument put forward by the A3 project team was that reflexivity in migration research may begin as an intellectual exercise but needs to result in a methodological and epistemological intervention. By systematically historicizing the production of migration knowledge, the project seeks to dismantle entrenched epistemologies and open new spaces for critical engagement. Thus, reflexive migration research functions as both a critique of existing knowledge structures and a constructive effort to develop alternative frameworks.
Ultimately, the talk underscored the transformative potential of reflexivity combined with the historical perspective in migration studies. By revealing the embeddedness of academic knowledge in broader social and political structures, researchers are challenged to rethink the ways in which migration is conceptualized, studied, and governed. Reflexivity, when fully integrated into the research process, is not just a tool for critique, but a pathway toward epistemological emancipation.
OpenEdition schlägt Ihnen vor, diesen Beitrag wie folgt zu zitieren:
Christoph Rass (24. Januar 2025). History @ SFB 1604 | Project A3 talk on reflexivity and research practice. NGHM@UOS. Abgerufen am 25. April 2025 von https://doi.org/10.58079/135uw